


Steal a Sailor from the Sea

by Mighty_Ant



Category: Disney Duck Universe, DuckTales (Cartoon 2017)
Genre: Developing Relationship, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, First Dates, Post-Louie's Eleven, Self Confidence Issues, Self-Doubt, Slow Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-21
Updated: 2020-05-21
Packaged: 2021-03-02 18:15:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,163
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24301219
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mighty_Ant/pseuds/Mighty_Ant
Summary: Daisy doesn't realize right away that Donald is a part of “that” Duck family.
Relationships: Daisy Duck/Donald Duck
Comments: 25
Kudos: 507





	Steal a Sailor from the Sea

When Daisy meets Donald’s kids, something about them strikes her as familiar. 

She doesn’t give it too much thought just then, not when Donald is fumbling through introducing his children and his bandmates and singing to her so sweetly from the stage. A night that had started out a disaster fit to end her career turned into one of the best in recent memory, with her dress on the IT List and a handsome man pulling her aside when his kids start yawning to ask her for her number. 

“I’d, uh, I’d like to see you again,” Donald says, rubbing the back of his neck. His eyes dart to hers and away again, focusing on some faraway point beyond her left shoulder. “If that’s what you want, too, obviously.”

He’s so delightfully transparent with her that Daisy can’t help but be charmed anew. “You better believe it, buster,” she replies, stepping closer to try and catch his skittish gaze. “You can’t sing to a girl like that and leave her without so much as a phone call.”

She delights in his blush, but even more in the way his smile lights up his whole face. 

Daisy catches his phone when he drops it fumbling to pull it out of his pocket and they exchange numbers. The night ends not long after that, with Donald herding both his sleepy-eyed and protesting children as well as his bandmates into the back of his weathered station wagon. Here Donald pauses again with one foot inside his car to look back at Daisy on the curb. 

“You have a ride home, don’t you?” he asks, a worried frown turning down the edges of his beak. He casts an uncertain glance toward his own crowded backseat, the space taken up by his three kids and Panchito. 

Like a bloodhound, Panchito seems to latch onto the crux of Donald's predicament and leans forward over the row of front seats to crow, “Dile que la podemos dar un aventón , Donald!” While Daisy doesn’t understand exactly what he’s saying, she’s come to understand that Donald’s friends seem to make a game of winding him up, and his mischievous expression speaks volume enough. 

He adds, “José puede venir atrás conmigo y los niños.”

“¡Fala sério!” José retorts, laughing as he twists around in the front seat. 

Webby seems to be the only one of Donald’s kids to be in on the joke, and she hides her giggles behind her hands while Dewey and Louie demand to know what was said. 

Donald looks up as though asking some heavenly power to give him a reason not to kick his bandmates to the curb. Daisy decides to spare him any further grief, though she can’t help a bit of a laugh herself as she does so. 

“Don’t worry, my car’s parked just around the corner,” she says, and is awarded Donald’s relieved smile. 

“Okay. Then I’ll...see you soon?”

“Definitely,” she replies, smiling back at him as she clutches at her purse strap. 

Donald nods jerkily. “Uh, good.” He seems to scramble for something else to say and when he comes up empty says, “Well...bye,” and ducks into his car, closing the door behind him. The jeers of his friends and children pursue him out of the parking lot and leave Daisy giggling on the sidewalk until she’s pink in the face. 

Later, when she’s finally back home and throwing her poor, stained coat onto the back of her coach she notices that she received a text sometime during her drive. To her elation, it’s from Donald. The message itself is short, but based on the timestamp had to have been sent not long after he got home as well. 

_Does coffee next Tuesday sound okay?_

Daisy only feels a little silly, grinning at her brightly lit phone screen in her dark living room. She responds eagerly, already thinking of Donald’s warm eyes and worn, brilliant smile. 

_Coffee sounds great. How about 11 at the Peck’s on Fourth?_

  
  


One coffee date turns into two which turns into walks on the marina followed by burgers and shakes on the pier and then a double feature at a drive-in in St. Canard. Before Daisy knows it, she’s been dating Donald Duck for nearly two months. 

He’s unlike any person she’s ever dated, which is rather the opposite of a bad thing. He’s a parent, first and foremost; his kids may call him uncle, but he’s a father in every sense of the word. His phone is dominated with photos of his four children, and he can talk about them easily and at great length. In fact, on their first date he seems to latch onto this topic of conversation until she gently redirects him. 

Donald is in the middle of gushing about how Huey, his oldest, nearly advanced to Senior Woodchuck status, only to sputter and briefly stall out when she brushes her fingers lightly over the back of his hand. 

“Your kids sound incredible,” she says, and means it, the pride in Donald’s countenance alone enough to convince her, “but what about you?”

“Me?” he responds, like no one’s ever bothered to ask. The very thought saddens her because he’s been nothing short of wonderful since she first got to know him. But also because she finds him so _interesting_ ; everything about him is a dichotomy, from his rough voice and kind heart to his shy and clumsy nature around her contrasted with his cool head and adeptness in the face of danger. 

“Yeah, you,” Daisy says, raising her brows over the rim of her coffee cup as she takes a sip. “Tell me about Donald Duck.”

He chuckles quietly and taps his fingers against the table’s edge. “Not much to tell, really,” he says. 

“I’m sure that’s not true,” Daisy replies wryly. “Not just any guy would let his kid stage a break-in at the most high-class party in the city just to get his old college band a little recognition.”

Sputtering into his coffee cup, Donald nods in acquiesce. “You got me there,” he says, rubbing the back of his neck. He doesn’t speak again, looking uncertain, and Daisy can only surmise that he’s out of practice when it comes to dating. Seeing as how his kids seem to be his whole world, it doesn’t surprise her. And if that’s the case, Daisy figures he wouldn’t mind a bit of help. 

“How about this,” she says, leaning forward a little over their small, shared table. “We each take turns saying one fact about ourselves. Like twenty questions, but in reverse.”

A small grin spreads across Donald’s face, surprised and hesitantly delighted. “Okay,” he says. “You go first.”

“Hmm.” Daisy makes a show of thinking hard about it. “Fact one: I’m a Taurus.”

“Gemini,” Donald replies. 

“Gemini?” She clicks her tongue with a put upon expression. “Sorry, I don’t think this is gonna work out,” Daisy says in as tragic a tone as she can muster and goes to stand. 

Donald barks a startled burst of laughter that has him clapping his hands over his beak. 

“Fact two,” Daisy says, reaching out to gently guide his hand away from his beak. “I like your laugh.”

A blush races across the top of his bill but it doesn’t deter the return of his tentative smile. “Fact,” he replies after a moment, “I have a twin.”

“Gemini twins,” Daisy exclaims. “What’re the odds of that?”

Donald doesn’t elaborate on this mystery twin and Daisy doesn’t pry; there has to be a reason he’s raising kids who call him uncle instead of dad, and that isn’t a conversation suited to a first date. 

“Fact three: I’ve worked for Miss Glamour for six years,” she says. 

Donald grins bashfully. “I’ve worked somewhere close to two hundred jobs.”

Daisy’s eyes go wide. “You’re joking.” 

He raises his hands, laughing a little. “Honest! Everything from accountant to trash collector; if you can think of it, I’ve probably done it.”

The more Daisy coaxes Donald out of his shell, the easier conversation between them flows and the more convinced she is that she made the right decision in him. Hours pass before either of them thinks to look down at their phone, only to realize that their date has gone on longer than perhaps either of them intended or expected. Not that Daisy’s upset in the least, though she does feel a little guilty for the way Donald’s brow jumps to his hairline when he sees the time. 

“I didn’t realize we’d been talking for so long,” he says, looking a little flustered. 

“I can think of worse ways to spend five hours.” Daisy replies coyly at first but sobers with genuine concern. “Are your kids alright, though? I didn’t even think to ask if you needed to get home to them by a certain time.” 

Donald smiles, appreciative. “It’s fine, they’re with my uncle today,” he says, but once more doesn’t elaborate, continuing to be vague about his family when it doesn’t revolve around his four kids. 

They agree to a second date, same time and place, and Donald offers to drive her home like she hoped he would. There isn’t space on her street for him to part, but as they’re idling by the curb he looks at Daisy with a smile that leaves her breathless.

“Thank you for coffee,” he says. “I’m...I’m really looking forward to seeing you again.”

“Thanks for the conversation,” Daisy returns, and marvels at how pleased that makes him. 

She climbs out of his car a moment later, only slightly disappointed he didn’t try to kiss her goodbye. Under different circumstances she might think they were moving too fast, but with Donald Duck it feels right. She fell a little in love from the moment he first sang to her, and he’s done nothing to dissuade her since. On the contrary, as transparent as he is with her, he’s a closely guarded man with a family he loves and a history he doesn’t expand on, all of which intrigue her to no end. 

So for the rest of the week, amid her regular assistant work and a slew of calls from fashion designers and clothing companies looking to endorse her, she thinks about Donald Duck and looks forward to when she’ll see him next

  
  


As the weeks go by and Daisy starts to lose track of the number of times they’ve gone out together, Daisy learns bits and pieces about Donald’s family. She also learns that he’s a phenomenal dancer. 

She discovers a quaint bar and grill on the waterfront with live music and a small dance floor and imagines Donald would look lovely in the candlelight. He does, but not only that, once their plates have been cleared and they’re halfway through their glasses of wine, he stands up from the table and holds out his hand to her. 

“May I have this dance?” he asks warmly as she looks up at him in surprise. 

“You may,” she answers after the barest pause, an incredulous smile curling her beak as she takes Donald’s hand, letting him guide her onto the dance floor. 

While he may be clumsy in the everyday, in this as in his fight against Graves his confidence is warranted. The band is playing a slow, smooth melody that Donald easily matches, gently pulling her into his arms with an adeptness that makes her heart skip. With a hand on her waist and the other clasped around hers, he guides her in a waltz around their small corner of the dance floor. 

Daisy is content letting him lead as he twirls her beneath his arm, utterly charmed by this new facet of Donald Duck she’s been allowed to uncover. She can’t help her gasp when he dips her lightly, his hand splayed warm and sure on her lower back, bunching the material of his sleeve with one hand in her surprise. 

“Where’d you learn moves like that, tiger?” Daisy is still a little bit breathless, and finds it difficult to stop smiling. The closest they’ve ever come to anything like this is swaying gently in her kitchen to music from her phone, the lights fuzzy and dim around them. This is _leagues_ away from that. 

Donald grins, blushing high in his cheeks at her pet name for him. “I traveled a lot when I was younger,” he explains, slowing their dance as they talk. “For years I wanted to be a musician so every new place we went to I’d try to go on my own and explore the local culture. I picked up some stuff along the way; some instruments, some dances.”

He amazes her at every turn without even trying to, much less realizing it. Daisy doesn’t think she’ll ever get enough of his easy confidence as he guides her across the dance floor, erasing any evidence of the self-doubt that keeps him from fully opening up to her. 

Donald is already holding her close, but Daisy closes the distance between just a little bit more, until their chests are nearly flush. 

“Is that your way of saying you’d like to take me dancing again?” she asks with artfully lowered lashes. 

He sputters, at her proximity or her look or perhaps both, but his smile remains. In fact, it might actually grow. “I’d love to,” he says, and dips her unexpectedly, laughing that lovely, rasping laugh of his when she squawks in alarm and smacks his arm. 

Once dinner and dancing is done, they walk arm in arm on the beach, wet sand alternately sticking to their feet and washing away under the cool lapping waves. Donald holds her heels for her so she can gesture with her free hand as she talks, and more than a night of elegant dancing, it’s wordless favors such as this that make Daisy fall just a little bit more in love with him. 

She’s been called “too much” by friends and lovers alike: too angry, too bossy, too talkative. She knows she isn’t perfect, but with Donald she doesn’t feel like she has to be. It’s a wonderfully liberating feeling, to be _seen_ and not fear any judgement. 

“An interview with Roxanne Featherly,” Daisy gushes, clinging to Donald’s arm as they amble down the beach. While their night out was intended to be in celebration of just that, it still leaves her reeling. Six months ago she was piecing together the perfect dress for the gala on a single mannequin in a corner of her apartment and now is only a handful of weeks away from opening her own studio. “I mean, I’ve seen firsthand what getting on the IT list can do for artists, but I still can’t believe it’s actually happening to me!”

“You deserve it,” Donald says fiercely. “Your designs are amazing, Dais. I’ll never forget the way you looked when I first saw you in that dress at the party.”

Daisy squeezes his arm gratefully. “You’re sweet.” She looks out across the dark sea where the twinkling lights of cruise ships gleam sporadically like stars. “It’s just a little hard to wrap my head around, y’know? After so many years I’d almost given up hope of ever becoming a real fashion designer.” Turning back toward Donald, she snorts. “My sister was against it from the start, back when I first went to fashion school. Called it a pipe dream.”

“Your sister?” 

A wash of affection settles over Daisy at the concern in his voice. “She was just trying to look out for me, in her own way,” she assures him. “We left home as soon as we were old enough to live on our own and she wanted me to find a career that would actually support me.”

Donald nods slowly. “When Della and I were young it felt like I was always having to keep her out of trouble.”

“Yeah?” Daisy prompts gently. His sister is still a mystery to her; the handful of times they’ve Muzzletimed she’s only ever seen his kids crowding in the background, clamoring to say hello or embarrass Donald in some way. She knows that Della didn’t raise her own children but based on Donald’s lack of ire whenever he mentions her, she suspects that it wasn’t by choice. 

He chuckles, washing away the quiet, introspective look on his face. “Between her and my uncle, it was like wrangling toddlers even before the boys were around.” 

“Sounds like a handful,” Daisy says, gently nudging him with her hip. 

“It’s family,” he says with a shrug, but there’s nothing casual about his tone. “What’re you gonna do?”

  
  


Family indeed. 

It’s not two weeks later that Daisy is sitting down to watch some television in her living room late one evening. She has a mug of sleepy time tea in hand and is idly flipping through channels when she lands on a news special commemorating the one year anniversary of the Shadow War. She would have skipped right by that too, less than keen on revisiting her memories of that night, when a series of familiar faces catch her attention. 

_“—de Spell was defeated by Scrooge McDuck and his family exactly one year ago today.”_

Everyone in Duckburg knows what Scrooge McDuck looks like. It’s impossible to set foot downtown without seeing his name on a building or a billboard or hearing it in passing conversation. And there McDuck is onscreen with his trademark cane, spats and top hat, but even more recognizable to Daisy are his family members surrounding him. 

Donald’s kids are clamoring at the sides of the richest duck in the world, feathers dirty and clothing scorched, but celebrated alongside him in a rerun that Daisy has seen before, one year ago when it first aired. Some distant part of her memory had recognized them that night of Glamour’s party, but hadn’t been able to put the pieces together. 

Daisy fumbles for the remote, spilling some of her tea on the rug in her hurry to pause the broadcast. 

There. Behind his kids but not fully in frame is Donald Duck. Her boyfriend, fiercely protective of his family and strangely tightlipped about them at the same time, apparently partially responsible for saving Duckburg a year ago alongside the most infamous man in the city. 

Stunned, she falls back against the couch, the remote hanging loosely from her fingers. Her tea cools on the coffee table, forgotten. 

An hour after that, once she’s collected herself and the magnitude of what she’s learned no longer threatens to overwhelm her, she gives Donald a call. 

He always answers quickly, and this night is no exception. “Hey, toots,” he greets, an endearment that usually makes her laugh, but tonight she can barely manage a smile. “Everything okay?”

“That depends,” she replies, keeping her tone light, “were you ever going to tell me you were related to Scrooge McDuck?”

There’s silence on the other end of the line for almost a full minute, and Daisy can perfectly picture Donald’s fullbody wince. 

“Can I come over?” he requests at last. 

“That’s probably a good idea.” 

Within the next half hour, Donald is sitting at her kitchen table, scruffy and sleepy eyed in a green sweatshirt. He looks almost afraid, ever since she opened her door, like he’s expecting an interrogation. The last thing Daisy ever wants is him to be afraid of her, so she reaches across the table and takes his hand. Donald’s shoulders tense when she moves, but she doesn’t react short of resting their clasped hands on the table’s surface. When the panic begins leaking out of his features she decides to start.

“So…” 

“So,” Donald intones, like a man condemned. “I’m Scrooge McDuck’s nephew.”

“The same Scrooge McDuck who owns all of Duckburg?” Daisy replies. “The one who goes on all those crazy adventures? Richest duck in the world? That Scrooge McDuck?”

He sighs. “Daisy, I—”

“I’m not finished,” she chides gently, pressing Donald’s hand. He obliges her, closing his beak with a clack and a pained expression that’s enough to make her falter. “Honey, I...I’m not mad at you. It’s just that this is a big thing to keep from me and it makes me wonder what else you’re not telling me.”

“There’s nothing else,” he says at once, “nothing that doesn’t come back to my family.”

Daisy frowns slightly. “Why didn’t you just tell me?” 

“Everything with my family,” Donald stops, leaning heavily against the table and sweeping a hand through his head feathers. “I love them, but they’re...a lot. It’s hard to explain to someone who’s so normal.”

“Normal?” Daisy repeats skeptically. 

“I don’t mean it as a bad thing!” he waves one hand frantically. “For _years_ all I wanted was for us to be a normal family. Normal always meant safe, it meant I didn’t have to spend my nights up wondering who I was going to lose next.”

Daisy’s stomach drops, and she reaches out with her free hand as well. “Donald, what…?”

“You know how Della wasn’t in the boys’ lives until a few months ago?” At Daisy’s nod, he sweeps a hand down his face. “She was stuck on the moon for ten years. That’s why.” 

Daisy blinks and blinks again, leaning back in her seat. _The moon,_ she thinks, barely able to process the magnitude of that loss. After a full blown alien invasion it shouldn’t feel as shocking as it does, but hearing the words in her small, quiet kitchen makes them literally otherworldly. 

“This is what I mean when I say my family isn’t anyone’s definition of normal,” Donald goes on miserably. “It’s been a struggle for me to accept that this is the way we are, and I’ve known them my entire life. I didn’t want to overwhelm you, or scare you away by telling you too much at once.”

Seeing how heavily this has been weighing on him, Daisy forcibly shakes off her shock. As startling as this has been for her to hear, she can’t imagine how difficult it is for Donald to say. 

“Hey there, Mr. Big Shot,” she murmurs, squeezing his hand to get his attention. “Sorry to burst your bubble, but I’m not going anywhere.”

Donald clings to her hands like a lifeline. “My family goes on life-threatening adventures for fun,” he warns, but a fragile hope gleams in his eyes. 

“I got that,” Daisy replies wryly. “I do watch the news, you know.”

He ducks his head, huffing a quiet laugh. “I’ve been wanting to introduce you,” Donald admits in a soft tone of voice that makes Daisy’s heart give a pang. “The kids already love you and Della’s nagging me nonstop about bringing you to the mansion. I was just...afraid I might be moving too fast.”

The same kids who fight sorceresses and aliens on the regular. Della, the sister who was trapped on the _moon_ for a decade. The _mansion_ of the richest duck in the world, sitting on high in a blatant declaration of wealth and power.

Daisy would be lying if she said she wasn’t at least a little overwhelmed by this entire hidden facet of her boyfriend’s life. One gets used to strangeness when living in Duckburg, but it’s one thing to exist on the fringes of it and quite another to confront it face to face. She may be confident in her ability to roll with the punches life throws, but Donald was right; she _is_ normal. She worries what it might mean for them if it takes too long to adapt this time. 

However, in spite of her new, niggling self-doubts, there’s one thing Daisy’s certain of. 

“I love you, Donald Duck,” she says, basking in the warmth of his smile like the break of dawn. “I’m ready for whatever you can throw at me.”

Or, at least she hopes she is. 

  
  
  
  
  


Daisy opens her eyes to the familiar ceiling of the mansion’s TV room. 

Which is a little odd, considering that the last time she blinked she was definitely outside. She clenches her eyes shut for a moment, but the ceiling remains wooden and dark and certainly not sky. 

“Daisy?” a familiar voice, roughened further by worry, cuts the silence. She turns her head to the side, finding Donald perched beside her on the coffee table. Seeing her awake, he blows out a long breath, relief smoothing the pinch of a frown between his eyes but not vanishing it completely. “You’re awake.”

His presence explains nothing, not why she’s lying down on the TV room’s long black couch or how she got here. But just having him near starts to relax her. 

“Donald.” She smiles at him, until she realizes he isn’t smiling back. “What-what happened?”

He shakes his head, huffing a desperate sort of half-laugh. “What happened is that you scared me half to death.”

“I don’t remember.” She starts to sit up and her head briefly spins. Everything feels a little fuzzy. “Did I...faint?”

“Whoa, no sudden moves, okay?” Donald reaches for her at once, steadying her with a hand on her arm. 

Stubbornly, she pushes herself up until she’s sitting against the armrest. “What happened?” she asks, more firmly this time. 

Donald leans back a little, releasing his hold on her shoulder. He won’t look her in the eye, and she bobs her head in an attempt to catch his gaze. “Donald?” 

“Do you...you don’t remember?” He rubs the back of his neck, shoulders heavily bowed. 

Daisy shakes her head. “No, no I’m sure I do. Give me a second.” Her memories are murky, as though she’s peering at them through a veil. “I came to the mansion for lunch, right?” She recalls Donald spreading out a blanket on the grass a few dozen feet away from the houseboat and the mansion proper. As if she could forget his bashful smile; despite her best efforts, he was always at least a little embarrassed by his inability to pay for lavish dates. 

“I remember us sitting down to eat...you made those little sandwiches I like...but then the kids-the kids started yelling.” Daisy bolts upright, and starts to get up off the couch despite the wave of dizziness that threatens to overtake her. “Are they alright? Did something happen?”

Donald reaches out again to push her back onto the couch but he stops just shy of touching her. “The kids are fine,” he says, but doesn’t look any less pained. 

“Then what happened?” Daisy leans back against the couch, ice trailing down her spine. “Donnie, you’re worrying me.” 

“There was…” he pauses, as though searching for the words. “An accident. They were messing with a lamp they found on their last adventure with Scrooge thinking there might be a genie inside.”

She hesitates. “I’m guessing not?”

“Definitely not.” Donald clutches his hands together in his lap so tightly his knuckles stand out through the feathers. “They released a demon, or something. Uncle Scrooge called it a soul eater. It got away from the kids and found us outside before we were able to force it back inside its lamp.”

Daisy can’t help bringing a hand to her chest, reassuring herself with the rapid beat of her heart beneath her palm. “It didn’t steal my soul, did it?” she tries to joke, and by the way Donald flinches she almost thinks the opposite might be true. 

“No,” he says, easing her momentarily flare of panic. “You just—”

“Fainted,” Daisy finishes for him, a scowl curling her beak. Her feathers sting with embarrassment, made worse by the way Donald won’t even look at her. “I’m sorry,” she mutters, bitterness sitting heavily in the back of her throat. 

His head whips up. “What?” he looks aghast. “Why-why are you sorry?”

She scoffs weakly. “Donald, I passed out and left you alone to fight a demon. Your kids were more helpful than I was.”

“Daisy, I’m the one who should be sorry,” he says. “I shouldn’t have put you in danger like that in the first place.”

“We were on a picnic, honey,” Daisy reminds him wanly. “You hardly threw me to the wolves.”

Donald’s features gentle, confusion settling in between his brows. “Then what’re you apologizing for?”

Now she’s the one finding it difficult to hold his gaze. “You and your family—you’re amazing. And crazy, don’t get me wrong. But you were right. I'm...normal. Maybe too normal.”

Donald’s scowl is one of utmost determination as he abandons his chair to take a seat beside her on the couch, gathering her in his arms. “Daisy, since the night we met you’ve been nothing short of amazing. You saw me. You _heard_ me.” His arms tighten around her, and Daisy happily melts into his embrace. 

“You don’t know how hard it was for me to come back here, to let the kids start going on adventures. It’s so easy to lose perspective when you’re treasure-hunting in parallel dimension or flying into the mouth of an active volcano. It’s the reason Della took the Spear in the first place.” He presses a kiss to her temple. “You keep me grounded, Dais. Believe me, being normal isn’t a bad thing.”

Daisy blinks away tears. “Well when you say it like that,” she murmurs. Denying the sincerity in Donald’s voice would be a fool’s errand that she’s not interested in pursuing. What with her years of practice, it’s impossible sometimes not to doubt herself but Donald’s admiration has long since garnered the ability to take out the worst of the sting. 

She turns her head, intent on kissing Donald properly, when the door to the TV room opens behind them. Huey sticks his head in. 

“Is Aunt Daisy awake yet?” he whispers, only to startle when they both turn to face him. Huey’s face swiftly becomes as red as his shirt, and Daisy is certain she’s on the brink of joining him. “Oh! Um. You are! Good! I’m just...gonna go then.” 

He turns around and disappears through the doorway, not stopping to close it behind him. A cascade of voices on the other side of the open door follows Huey’s departure, audible now without the barrier. 

“Well? How is the lass?”

“Yeah, is Daisy okay?” 

“Why’re you all red?”

Daisy buries her face in Donald’s chest, hiding her pink cheeks. His arms come up around her shoulders, holding her close. 

“I-I didn’t tell them to call you that,” Donald stammers, going for a laugh but his voice, high and tight with fear, gives him away. 

Still unaccountably flustered, Daisy raises her head long enough to drop a kiss against the underside of his jaw before tucking her head beneath his chin. “I, um.” Her heart jumps up into her throat. “I don’t mind it.”

She hears the click of Donald’s throat against her ear. “I’ll keep that in mind,” he says, sounding dazed.   
  



End file.
